Descendants of Jan Locrherst

14.CORNELIUS10 RINGO (PHILLIP(JUDGE)9, JANNETJE8VAN STOUTENBURG, PIETER7, WILLEM(WILLIAM) S.6VAN OLDENBARNEVELDT, JOHAN5, GERRIT4, REIJER3, ALEIDJANSDER2VAN LOCRHERST, JAN1LOCRHERST) was born April 28, 1739 in Amwell Twp, Hunterdon, NJ, and died February 1824 in Henry Co., Kentucky. He married MARGARET(PEGGY) SWITCHER November 03, 1758 in New York City, NY, daughter of LUDWELL SWITCHER. She was born July 01, 1741 in New York City, NY, and died 1800 in Kentucky.

Notes forCORNELIUS RINGO:
9. Cornelius Ringo (Judge Philip, Albertus Philipszen, Philip Janszen was born in Amwell, Hunterdon County, New Jersey 28 APR 1739. Cornelius died FEB 1824 in Henry County, Kentucky, at age 84. His body was interred after FEB 1824 at Sulphur Fork Graveyard in Campbellsburg, Henry County, Kentucky.

He married Margaret Switcher 3 NOV 1758 in New York, New York County, New
York. Margaret was born about 1741. (Additional notes for Margaret
Switcher Margaret died in Kentucky, at age unknown.

CORNELIUS RINGO, son of Philip Ringo and Jane Cook, was born April 28th, 1739 at his father's tavern-house in Amwell Township, Hunterdon County, New Jersey. He was their last child and fifth son. His father died less than two weeks after he had reached his 18th birthday.

Information regarding him is sparse but all indications are that he was apprenticed at an early age to become a shoemaker, following the trade of his grandfather, Albertus, and that of his uncle, Cornelius, for whom he was named.

He was still a minor when his father made a will on April 1st, 1757 which specified the details of his legacy. By its terms a plot of land, a bequest of personal funds and his fourth of the remainder of the estate, when he reached the age of 21, were to be his.

In the interim he appears to have been under the guardianship of his older brother, John, who succeeded his father as tavernkeeper. The funds willed directly to Cornelius were 60 pounds "proclamation" money, which was to be put out at interest for his use until reaching his majority.

The property, to be his, was the 25 acre tract, which his father had bought from John Ketchum and which lay adjoining the tavern on the west, but on the opposite side of the road from it, with the Old York Road curving through the southern part of it. No building is mentioned as being on it, and it appears to have contained an orchard and to have been used as a wood lot for the tavern.

Philip Ringo's will specifies that Cathrina, his second wife, shall have permission to gather fruit there and that his son, John, shall have the "use, profits, and benefits of said lott until such time as Cornelius reach the age of twenty-one years." It was further required of John Ringo that during this period he was "not to hire it out or impoverish it nor make any waste of the timber nor destroy the wood or suffer (this) to be done by others" and at the given time to "deliver quiet and peaceable possession in like tenantable repairs" to Cornelius.

Philip Ringo excepted from the 25 acre tract a fifty foot square at the "outermost"
corner, adjoining the land of Rudolf Harley, which he dedicated as a "Burying Yard" for the use of the family "for ever." He further designated "a road of ten feet wide," which was to run from the graveyard along the south side of Harley's line to "the King's Road leading to Trenton" (a point just opposite the tavern).

In the Fall of 1758 Cornelius Ringo was in New York City, probably visiting relatives there and viewing his grandfather's cottage, still standing and occupied on Broad Street. It was in that city and at the Dutch Reformed Church of his forbearers, that he was married on November 3rd, 1758 to Margaret Switcher (possibly Switzer, or Swits, a New York family associated in some ways with the Ringos).

Cornelius Ringo brought his new wife back to the Crossroads in Amwell, where they were probably squeezed into the family section of Ringo's Old Tavern. There they could "make do" until he came into his father's bequest. In the meantime Margaret must have helped out around the tavern, while Cornelius was out "skinning the cat" (traveling around the county with his tools to make shoes for the members of the various households).

By the time set for the transfer of the 25 acre tract, it must have become apparent to both the brothers, John ' and Cornelius, that this land was a necessary part of the tavern operation, better suited for that than for a parttime farmer with a growing family. There are no known deeds of transfer but in some legal manner the 25 acre tract became the possession of John Ringo, while Cornelius wound up with 18 acres and a house just a few hundred yards south of the tavern on the road to Trenton.

On February 5th, 1761, when he witnessed the will of Johannes Housel, a close
neighbor, he was probably living in his new home. Only a few months later on May 28th, 1761 his wife Margaret, gave birth to their first child, a boy, who bore the favorite name of the Ringo family John. Their second child, Alburtis (better known as Burtis) was born on February 25th, 1763 at their home in Amwell.

The young couple had at least two more children, both daughters probably born there also. They were Jane, thought to be born about 1765 and Mary, probably born about two years later in 1767.

By 1767, Cornelius Ringo was finding, as were his brothers, that the little "hard" money in circulation was beginning to dry up. Food for shoes was helpful, but only cash could pay off debts. His situation soon became one best described by a letter from "a gentleman in Hunterdon," which was published by the New York Gazette, who wrote:

"Must I see my Estate torn from me and sold for a Song, when help is so near at hand? The people of Hunterdon are in Want of Money. They are in Debt, and do not know how to extricate themselves. They are hard pressed by their Creditors and can not pay. They are sued. Judgements are obtained against them, they try to borrow, offer good security for the money, but all in vain, there is no money nor moneylenders. Their effects (are sold) for one fourth or fifth part of their value, because there are really no Buyers who can furnish the Money."

In the February Session of the Hunterdon County Court of Common Pleas in 1768,
which was held at Trenton, Joshua Corshon, a local man and frequent patron of Ringo's Old Tavern, "obtained a Judgement against Cornelius Ringoe." On November 23rd, 1768, Micajah How, Sheriff of the County, levied against the house and lot of 18 acres owned by Cornelius Ringo and sold the same to Jacob Moore, of Amwell.

Henry Ringo, Cornelius' older brother, who was going through the same problem at the same time, was able to hold out until 1768 by assistance from his brother, John. Indications are that the two families, Henry's and Cornelius', both left New Jersey at this time to make their way to new homes in Loudoun County, Virginia. When the November 1768 sale of his property took place, Cornelius Ringo is reported as"late of this (Hunterdon) County."

Cornelius' son, Burtis, stated in an affidavit that his parents were in 1770 living in Loudoun County, Virginia, near Goose Creek about a mile from the Powers Family farm there. The family must have continued to live in that location for an extended period of time, probably under one of the tenancy leases so common in Virginia, but very little is found in the surviving records of that area during their first ten years there.

Cornelius apparently continued to ply his trade as a shoemaker, while being a
part-time farmer. On November 17th, 1780, Cornelius Ringo and his wife Margaret, then married 22 years and with their children growing up, served as witnesses to the will of Ann Talbert of Loudon County. Earlier their son, John, had begun service in the Virginia Militia; and not to be outdone, their youngest son, Alburtis, only 16, had left home without permission, to go to Henrico County (Richmond) to enlist in the Virginia Cavalry.

The Virginia taxpayers list starting for the year 1782 shows Cornelius Ringo as paying a Personal Tax (as opposed to a Property Tax) in Loudoun County for every year through 1795. On June 15th, 1784 Cornelius Ringo and Nathan Cochrane were sued by John Thrailkill (apparently their landlord) and the Loudoun County Court ordered Ringo to pay 2,070 pounds of tobacco as settlement of the claim. (Tobacco, as a principal crop in Virginia, was frequently used as a monetary unit of exchange instead of money.) In 1785 Cornelius "Ringoe" bought 150 acres of land from the same John Thrailkill but only held it a year before reselling it to a Thomas Haines.

It is apparent that Cornelius Ringo moved from Loudoun County, Virginia to Nelson County, Kentucky as he paid taxes in Virginia in 1795 and in Kentucky in 1796. No mention is found in the records of his wife, Margaret, after 1780 and it is possible that her death could have been the reason for his change of location. Later census records in 1810 would show Cornelius, still in Nelson County as the head of a household with a female between 26 and 45 years of age (perhaps one of his daughters).

By 1799 his oldest son, John, had brought his family to Kentucky also and settled in Nelson County, apparently to be near his father. The county was a growing one and Cornelius was able to get around it by horseback to do his work, while maintaining a leasehold which was worked by a single slave of his.

In the Spring of 1803 at the age of 63, Cornelius made a visit to his brother Henry's place in Montgomery County, well over a hundred miles distance even as the crow flies. Henry Ringo, then in his late seventies was in ill health and on May 12th, 1802 made his will, which Cornelius Ringo witnessed.

John Ringo, Cornelius' son, occupied land in Nelson, which he had acquired through a military grant, and in 1806 when Shelby County was formed, his property lay in the new county, while his father continued to be a resident of Nelson. In the same year Alburtis, Cornelius' second son, arrived in Kentucky from Culpeper County, Virginia. He took up his military land grant in Fleming County near that of his cousins in Montgomery.

After getting his family settled in his new home, "Burtis" Ringo made the trip to Nelson County to see his father and to obtain a power of attorney from him so as to settle the estates of Cornelius' brothers, still open in New Jersey. He must also have visited with his brother John in nearby Shelby County to get caught up on family affairs and get reacquainted with his nephews and nieces.

After a similar visit to Montgomery County with the sons of Henry Ringo (now
deceased), for the same purpose, "Burtis" took off for the long trip to the old family homesite in Amwell Township, Hunterdon County, New Jersey. He was back at his home in Kentucky in 1807 and was able to deliver a settlement of 79 pounds to the heirs of Henry Ringo; and the same to his father, Cornelius, in Nelson County.

In that same year Cornelius is recorded as receiving there a payment of 25 shillings for services from the estate of Gervais Hammand; and his name is regularly found in the Nelson County Tax List each year through 1815, including the census record of his household in 1810. By 1816 his name had disappeared from the Nelson County records and is not found there. At that point in the research of his life, it appeared that he had died.

(In the early generations of the Ringo family, who followed the custom of their times, the repetition of the first names in the family frequently caused a confusion amongst both record keepers and researchers. Members of the family with the same names are sometimes referred to as John Senior and John Junior, when they were uncle and nephew, rather than father and son as is now done.)

In Kentucky between 1795 and 1815 there were four men, all bearing the name of
Cornelius Ringo. They were:

(1D2E) Cornelius Ringo, the subject of this sketch.

(1D2E1A) Cornelius Ringo, Grandson of the above through his son, John (1D2E1)

(1D2B1B) Cornelius Ringo, son of Philip (1D2B1) and Grandson of Henry (1D2B), the brother of Cornelius (1D2E) above.

(1D2B3) Cornelius Ringo, son of Henry Ringo (1D2B). He was the nephew and
namesake of Cornelius Ringo (1D2E) the subject of our sketch.

The latter Cornelius Ringo (1D2B3), along with his brother, Peter Ringo (1D2B2), were the two earliest members of the Ringo family to visit and explore Kentucky. Both of them visited the area often while it was still under active threat by the Indians in the years before their father, Henry (1D2B) decided to bring his family there.

Cornelius Ringo (1D2B3) had married in 1792 in what was then Bourbon County and before 1800 had a farm on the Little Kentucky River in Henry County, about 40 miles east of Nelson County. There he raised his family and attended the Sulphur Fork Baptist Church (near present-day Campbellsburg, Kentucky). He died in 1836 and is buried in the adjoining cemetery, as are his wife and some children.

The location of the grave of Cornelius Ringo (1D2B3) in the Sulphur Fork Baptist
Cemetery was well known to family members. In the early 1930's, the inscriptions on the large flat stones over his and his wife's graves were quite legible. By 1976 a diminishing congregation and inability to care for the cemetery had resulted in a generation deterioration of all the graves there. In that year an alert Ringo Researcher found in a volume of D.A.R. Ky., Cemetery Records (1960) under Henry County, Sulphur Fork Graveyard a listing of four gravestones, which is was later learned, were in a section of the cemetery abandoned about 1930.

This showed that in 1960 there were stones there for Benjamin Haydon (1760-1853), Benjamin Elston (1810-1884), Francis Varies (1766-1843) and "CORNELIUS RINGO.d.Feb.1824 in his 82nd year." While the age was two years short of being correct, there was only one Cornelius Ringo who could fit. Here was obviously the grave of Cornelius (1D2E), the subject of this reconstruction of his life.

Apparently Cornelius Ringo as he approached his 77th year of age, in Nelson County, instead of going to live out the rest of his life with his son, John, in Shelby County or with his son, "Burtis" in Fleming County, had opted to go live with his nephew and namesake, Cornelius Ringo (1D2B3) in Henry County. He had died there in February 1824, as he approached his 85th birthday.
Children of CORNELIUS RINGO and MARGARET SWITCHER are: